


Small Victories

by bakers_impala221



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alcoholism, Alcoholism Recovery, Alternate Universe, Biphobia, Depression, Established Relationship, Grief, Heterosexism, Homophobia, John Winchester's A+ Parenting, M/M, Mourning, Optimistic Ending, Past Child Abuse, Recently deceased father, Toxic Masculinity, abusive parenting, real world AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:42:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23947864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bakers_impala221/pseuds/bakers_impala221
Summary: Dean receives some bad news. It brings back old memories and feelings he's not able to deal with.Cas sticks by him through it... Until he doesn't.And Dean has never felt more alone.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Kudos: 11





	Small Victories

I willed myself to move. All I could manage was the slow, shaky rise of my arm to take a swig before I dropped it back to my side, defeated. The stale, murky taste lingered in my mouth as I swallowed, a taste of failure; life decayed and forgotten in the mist of numbness.

My back ached against the couch. My chest felt tight, as if a fisted hand choked the delicate, frayed webbing of my lungs. I hung my head as I felt the last drops hit the back of my throat and drip down into the abyss as if from the leaking, broken tap of an empty tank in its last moments.

I felt myself fill up on poison succour, full, yet as empty and unknown as a dying star. The void filled me, consuming every atom until each was numb and buzzing with unfuelled, draining energy.

Shaking the bottle with my hand, I felt for any final dregs, the thirst like desperate, hopeful hands groping through a long, dark tunnel for the exit. I let it go, hearing it clink softly as it mingled among the clutter.

I heaved myself up, hearing the vinyl crack under the stirring. Awake and disturbed after the long hours of rest. Like a reanimated body, I traipsed down the hallway, stopping outside the bedroom to peer in, momentarily frozen as I watched the bedsheets rise and fall.

I closed the door suddenly, snapped out of my trance, and I turned away, leaving the room behind untouched, like a forbidden treasure trove, as distant and unattainable as the Sun.

I hauled myself into the kitchen, reaching for the fridge to rest against it. Gripping its door, I could feel the funeral invitation brushing against my arm. Cas had put it there, pinned up with his favourite magnet; the one with the bee on it.

That had been his role in all this—arranging things. Dealing with the mess. Meanwhile, I did nothing.

When I’d first relapsed, Cas possessed an air of composure about him, as though I were a patient and only needed the time and space to heal.

He’d told me once, one late night, about his father’s addiction. The way he spoke, I could feel the heaviness in the air; the slow sinking feeling of a stone as it drifts to the bottom of the ocean, untethered and lost. The way Cas had been so disappointed in him, as if it were as simplistic as choice, as if life and expectations hadn’t painted a red bullseye across his father’s chest and left him scrambling with no choice but to build up an impenetrable wall against the tide. It had kept me silent. Even then, even with him, I knew I couldn’t talk about it.

He did understand some things, though. The way he’d stayed uncrowded, but close. How he’d smile when I got home from work, loving, but distanced enough for comfort, flicking the tv wordlessly to Dr Sexy and shifting a little bit closer once I’d sat down next to him on the couch. He’d been there, next to me, waiting it through to the finish line. And then, once that seemed too far out of reach, too unattainable— so did he.

When I’d gotten the phone call, Cas found me in the kitchen. I’d fallen; collapsed into myself. I think it’d shocked him at first. He’d taken a moment before collecting himself enough to help. I didn’t cry. He just helped me to the sofa and let me stare blankly at the plain, white wall.

It pressed back against me dauntingly. The textured plaster as thin and breakable as ice.

“That’s what it always felt like,” I’d said. “Walking on ice.”

I’d stood up suddenly, taken two long strides before I punched. I could hear Cas gasp behind me, could feel the blood drip slowly from my knuckles as I left the room. When I’d next gone back in there, the hole was still open, a gaping and vulnerable wound.

As he’d climbed tensely into bed that night, I stayed silent, unmoving as a corpse. I had never considered myself secretive before, but I supposed this was what I had become. Burdened and unyielding as stone.

The next morning, he found me in the kitchen by the fridge, and lowered himself to sit next to me on the tiles.

“Dad was like this.” I said. “Guess I got it from him.”

He stayed silent, thoughtful.

“There’s always treatment, Dean” he said finally.

I swallowed. “Yeah...”

_Not for him, though._

No. That was the finality of it; the cold, glittering reality of life. Mortality. It burned, ice-cold and sharp. Its caustic teeth dug painfully into my throat. It was inescapable.

Dad was gone.

Later, Cas had brought it up again.

“I was never diagnosed,” he said, “But I had a problem for a bit.”

“Yeah, what’d you do? See some shrink?”

“Yeah,” he said simply.

I looked up sharply, snapped out of my stupor.

He shrugged. “I just learned to focus on good things. Bees!” He grinned. “I didn’t have people, but I had bees... I would think, ‘What if I disappoint them?’”

I cracked a small smile at his loopy grin. I suppose he’d even considered that a victory.

One morning, he didn’t say goodbye. Everything had gone silent, like an absent heartbeat leaving nothing but the monotone beep of a heart monitor. Since then, I’d become a dormant volcano, untouched and avoided, while the world around me waited, bracing, for the eruption.

I heaved myself upright and took a step back to open the fridge. Squinting against the light, I reached in, searching half-blindly for the nearest bottle. I stopped when my fingers brushed something soft. Blinking momentarily, I stooped down further, fisting my hand around it and tugging it out.

I opened out my fingers like an unfurling lotus. I eyed the yellow bee sitting lightly in my palm like an offering. My mind whirred to life like a computer rebooting, slowly processing. When I finally understood, the world came almost to a halt, the only audible sounds the ticking of the clock and my thumping heartbeat.

I closed the fridge door, eyeing the paper pinned to its front.

“The funeral’s on Wednesday,” Cas had said, and I sat silently, hunched over at the kitchen table, two hands wrapped around a bottle like it was a mid-winter coffee, watching as he pinned the invitation to the fridge with the magnetic bee. It held hard, firm, in unwavering loyalty.

The soft toy bee sat patiently in my hand, gazing out across the room with a peaceful, humanoid smile. My heartbeat slowed, and the noise tuned back into normal frequency. I smiled, small and hesitantly back.

Slowly, I turned around, moving back down the hallway, pausing for a moment when I reached the door, contemplating.

Mustering courage, I pushed it open and tiptoed across the rug and placed the bee gently on the bedside table. I untucked the duvet and climbed into the bed.

Next to his peaceful, sleeping form, calmness washed over me until my mind was as settled and quiet as his. Eventually, I drifted off, and our breaths fell in sync. Like harmonic waves, they pushed and pulled, patient and purposeful, rhythmic and steady, reminding us we were still together; reminding us that we were alive.


End file.
